In today's business world it is desirable, in order to save time and money, to have spreadsheets customized to a business's individual needs. One solution to this is creating spreadsheet templates by writing code. However, most business users do not have the necessary programming knowledge and code writing is a time-consuming process. Another option is to create a template within a spreadsheet, such as Microsoft Excel®, by using native Excel® functions. This, however can also be a time consuming process as most Excel® functions can only perform rudimentary commands on the spreadsheet and many commands may be necessary to customize a template to a business's needs. A third option is to purchase templates from a company that specializes in creating them. However, it may be difficult to obtain a template that meets the exact needs of a business and it may also be difficult to obtain a customized template in a timely fashion if a deadline is approaching.
Several software applications deal with creating spreadsheet templates. For example, iLevel™ Software allows the creation of templates from various authoring tools, e.g., FrameMaker™ or Microsoft Word®, while using the commands native to that particular application. Another example is the Actuate® e.Spreadsheet designer, which allows for creation of Microsoft Excel® templates using menu options and wizards in an environment that closely resembles, but is not actually executed as part of, the Excel® application itself. Instead, a report generator program is executed against a database and set of virtual functions created by the template environment to produce an actual, expanded and resolved Microsoft Excel® spreadsheet as described in more example, in U.S. Publ. Appl. No. 2004/0088650A1, now U.S. Pat. No. 7,370,271.
There are many patents and published patent applications directed towards spreadsheet creation. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,883,623 is directed toward a general spreadsheet, including a method for building custom spreadsheet applications and U.S. Pat. No. 5,966,716 includes a template “wizard.” U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,640,234 and 6,725,422 are directed toward automatically applying formulas and cell addresses to a range of cells in a spreadsheet. U.S. Publ. Appl. No. 2004/0111666A1 having Ser. No. 10/425,088, now abandoned, describes a report replicator program for a spreadsheet that permits a user to more easily replicate portions of a report that are repeated within a spreadsheet to accommodate the actual data in a final report. U.S. Publ. Appl. No. 2004/0103366A1, now U.S. Pat. No. 7,266,763, describes a user-defined function definition feature extension for the Microsoft Excel® spreadsheet program. There are also several patents directed towards sharing automatically updating spreadsheets on a database as described for example, in U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,341,292 and 5,293,615.
While there have been substantial improvements in spreadsheets for presenting and managing data, it would be desirable to provide for a more efficient and effective way to create templates for a spreadsheet, particularly in a networked business environment.